Businesses can now participate on Google+ with brand “pages”

Google is beginning to roll out "pages" for Google+, allowing businesses, …

Google announced on Monday that it is adding a "pages" feature to Google+, allowing businesses and brands to join its homegrown social network. The new feature closely resembles Facebook's own popular pages feature, giving businesses a reason to care more about the growing Google+.

So far, only individuals have been allowed to make a Google+ profile; this was first invitation-only, but later opened to everyone in September. Google was originally very strict about users being 100 percent clear and honest about their identities on Google+, though the company recently made some changes to allow pseudonyms.

From what we've heard from our social media acquaintances, Google+ is beginning to be considered the next big thing in the industry, and Google just took one of the first major steps to make sure social media pros are paying attention by launching its pages feature. Any group, business, band, or brand will be able to create a page as a sort of profile. Individuals can add pages to circles, and the people behind pages can post links, hold virtual "hangouts," and more.

Google Senior Vice President of Engineering Vic Gundotra noted that users can "hang out live with the local bike shop, or discuss our wardrobe with a favorite clothing line, or follow a band on tour," while businesses can "find the super fans and loyal customers that want to say hello."

There are a limited number of pages already built for the launch, including the band All American Rejects, popular mobile game Angry Birds, basketball team Phoenix Suns, and Japanese car maker Toyota. Google said that anyone will be able to create a page "soon," and it appears that the feature is now ready according to Google's Dave Besbris.

Google is also implementing a related feature called "Direct Connect." Doing a search for "+toyota," for instance, will take you directly to Toyota's Google+ page. The feature doesn't appear to work for individuals, however. Direct Connect is also being rolled out incrementally, as Google said it doesn't yet work for all pages.

UPDATE: The original article suggested that the ability to create pages would roll out over time, and the feature wasn't available at the time it was written. However, we have verified that users can now create pages—the capability was switched on shortly after this article was published.

Being in a band, I just don't see the point. I already have to keep track of Facebook, Reverb Nation, Twitter, BandCamp, SoundCloud, and yes even MySpace. Having to go to yet another social network just honestly makes me a bit bitter. I don't really see the draw in Google+ over Facebook and would have rather Google tried to invent instead of reinvent. Sure, there are some neat features about Google+, but I would have rather they kept unique products like PowerMeter.

Being in a band, I just don't see the point. I already have to keep track of Facebook, Reverb Nation, Twitter, BandCamp, SoundCloud, and yes even MySpace. Having to go to yet another social network just honestly makes me a bit bitter. I don't really see the draw in Google+ over Facebook and would have rather Google tried to invent instead of reinvent. Sure, there are some neat features about Google+, but I would have rather they kept unique products like PowerMeter.

Honestly, as much as I don't use Facebook, Google+ really doesn't "gel" with me very much.

Oh good. It looks like the direct connect search does not interfere with the use of + to require a term be present of a search. It takes you straight to the Google+ page if there is only one term in the search, but retains it's old meaning if there are more terms.

Edit: Nevermind, they have eliminated the old use of +, and you have to use quotes around the word instead. For example, try 'banana +rhino pickle'; it now returns the same results as 'banana rhino pickle', while 'banana "rhino" pickle' returns what the + search used to.

Whether or not Google+ really takes off could be partially dependent on how Google differentiates its “pages” from Facebook’s pages feature.

I know we aren't supposed to comment on spam posts, but I have seen many other people make this same point, many furious that Google has been so slow to allow corporations on Google+, so I figured I would respond.

No. Just No. Advertizing does not drive people to social networks. People drive advertisers to social networks. The only way this could be a make/break feature is if they let the advertisers be so annoying that it drove people away from Google+, but fortunately they have been careful enough to avoid that.

Being in a band, I just don't see the point. I already have to keep track of Facebook, Reverb Nation, Twitter, BandCamp, SoundCloud, and yes even MySpace. Having to go to yet another social network just honestly makes me a bit bitter. I don't really see the draw in Google+ over Facebook and would have rather Google tried to invent instead of reinvent. Sure, there are some neat features about Google+, but I would have rather they kept unique products like PowerMeter.

Honestly, as much as I don't use Facebook, Google+ really doesn't "gel" with me very much.

I don't use Facebook all that much in general either, though find myself using it more as both a fan and musician. I do find it wildly superior to MySpace, though. I largely see Google+ as really no better or worse than Facebook so I don't see a need to change. Few people I know use Google+, and a good chunk of those only use it because they don't like Facebook for one reason or another and refuse to use it. I personally don't like the idea of using Google for everything - just a step closer to SkyNet...

Oh good. It looks like the direct connect search does not interfere with the use of + to require a term be present of a search. It takes you straight to the Google+ page if there is only one term in the search, but retains it's old meaning if there are more terms.

Edit: Nevermind, they have eliminated the old use of +, and you have to use quotes around the word instead. For example, try 'banana +rhino pickle'; it now returns the same results as 'banana rhino pickle', while 'banana "rhino" pickle' returns what the + search used to.

Pretty sure Google deprecated the "+" operator last week, likely in anticipation of Direct Connect. Would be nice if you could use it with user names and not just pages... but I could see conflicts happening right away What should get returned if you type in "+john smith" for instance.

Yeah, I don't understand that at all. Facebook definitely had the right idea here, e.g. http://facebook.com/toyota. Direct Connect basically seems like a kludge around that lack of usability, but only for pages, not individuals.

Sounds like there are some bugs, but I will likely have another outlet to track in the next week or two along with Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, Yelp, etc. Time to start working on that multi-picture "banner"...

This is pretty raggedy for a launch product, right now we can't add other people as admins for the Ars G+ account.

Yup, just noticed that too. Don't think I'll be using this until they work out admin/mod privileges and sensible URLs.

I'm waiting since ages for Google to do something sensible with contacts in Google Apps, like delegation and contacts sharing within a domain. Meanwhile I think that hell will freeze over before they notice that companies and organizations (and even families) need more than an isolated address book for each user that only this very user can access and edit. Never expect Google to do the right thing even if it's biting their nose.

Anyway, I think Google+ is already dead in the water. There's very little it really does better than FB and FB has the users and mindshare. Too late, too little, too similar.

Yeah, I don't understand that at all. Facebook definitely had the right idea here, e.g. http://facebook.com/toyota. Direct Connect basically seems like a kludge around that lack of usability, but only for pages, not individuals.

Except that when a business creates a facebook page they do in fact get a weird long URL just like that. They have to get 25 likes or something before they can get a pretty URL. I know because my business recently set up a page and I couldn't work out why we didn't have the nice URL.

It's a start, but there's not much that's different than a normal profile at the moment. It's also missing a way to post things in different languages (something that's important to me up here in Canada). I don't want to post everything twice, forcing people in one language to read something in another.

I'm sure it'll all be added, but I don't like waiting for it (especially as this adds to the workload to update and manage another location)

I know a lot of people are down on G+, but I have to say I have really been liking it. It isn't Facebook. If you try and use it like Facebook, you are going to hate it. It is much more like a thoughtful Twitter.

I am following ~250 people right now.

I have like 10 friends who I share stuff back and forth with. Most of that sharing is for when I want to have a thoughtful conversation. We have had just some excellent back and forth the likes of which is hard to do on Facebook. The other thing I do with my friends is share content that I don't want to blast to the 200+ Facebook "friends" that I have. It is nice to have a place where I can post pictures of me passed out in a pool of vomit in a woman's dress and make sure that it just hits the folks who will find that hilarious. True, Facebook has some capacity to do this, but G+ lets me do this with a pretty high level of confidence.

The rest of what G+ for me is a big stream of awesome. I have three big following only circles. One is artists, one is tech, one is "other interesting people". The content is fantastic. With 250+ people it is fast moving. At 250+, I don't have enough time to view everything. So, while G+ might not be booming, it is big enough that it doesn't matter.

It is like comparing the number of apps in the iOS market vs the Android market. They both have enough where it doesn't matter. What you really care about is the ability to find quality, and I find the quality of the stuff I find on G+ to be very high.

Your millage my vary, but if you fool around with G+, I suggest you use it like an incoming Twitter stream. Find someone you like who has shared a good circle or two and you will have a pile of people you are following in no time. If you have friends on G+ that use it, that is just a bonus. I do think that G+ works awesome if your friends use it... but your friends have to use it. For now, it is awesome simply for following interesting public people. The content just seems to be so much more thoughtful and interesting than Twitter and Facebook that it has become a pretty regular part of my daily intertubes crawling.

I know a lot of people are down on G+, but I have to say I have really been liking it. It isn't Facebook. If you try and use it like Facebook, you are going to hate it. It is much more like a thoughtful Twitter.

I am following ~250 people right now.

I have like 10 friends who I share stuff back and forth with. Most of that sharing is for when I want to have a thoughtful conversation. We have had just some excellent back and forth the likes of which is hard to do on Facebook. The other thing I do with my friends is share content that I don't want to blast to the 200+ Facebook "friends" that I have. It is nice to have a place where I can post pictures of me passed out in a pool of vomit in a woman's dress and make sure that it just hits the folks who will find that hilarious. True, Facebook has some capacity to do this, but G+ lets me do this with a pretty high level of confidence.

The rest of what G+ for me is a big stream of awesome. I have three big following only circles. One is artists, one is tech, one is "other interesting people". The content is fantastic. With 250+ people it is fast moving. At 250+, I don't have enough time to view everything. So, while G+ might not be booming, it is big enough that it doesn't matter.

It is like comparing the number of apps in the iOS market vs the Android market. They both have enough where it doesn't matter. What you really care about is the ability to find quality, and I find the quality of the stuff I find on G+ to be very high.

Your millage my vary, but if you fool around with G+, I suggest you use it like an incoming Twitter stream. Find someone you like who has shared a good circle or two and you will have a pile of people you are following in no time. If you have friends on G+ that use it, that is just a bonus. I do think that G+ works awesome if your friends use it... but your friends have to use it. For now, it is awesome simply for following interesting public people. The content just seems to be so much more thoughtful and interesting than Twitter and Facebook that it has become a pretty regular part of my daily intertubes crawling.

I concur with this guy.

One shortcut to get involved/find people to follow is to go to the search box at the top of the G+ page and type "shared circle <interest>" where <interest> is...er... one of your interests e.g. "shared circle photography" and find circles that others have shared publicly relating to your hobbies or pastimes which you can then add to your own circles.

Just because they announced changes it doesn't mean they've made them, or did I miss something?

No. They haven't done anything. As you can see in the link in the article, they've just said they're going to do something some time.

Their original announced 'official' names policy turned out to be different from what they actually did so even when they announce a new policy it will still have to be tested since we know they can't be trusted on this.

And since you risk the possible shutdown of other Google services when/if Google shuts off your Google+ access because some functionary thinks your name looks funny I'd advise backing up all your data stored on Google before trying Google+.

Pretty sure Google deprecated the "+" operator last week, likely in anticipation of Direct Connect. Would be nice if you could use it with user names and not just pages... but I could see conflicts happening right away What should get returned if you type in "+john smith" for instance.

Maybe they could have Direct Connect for regular users, but make it work only when you're logged in, and only for people in your circles. That would at least minimize the problem of very common names. Companies could still get globally unique Direct Connect names that would work even for people without (or not logged in to) Google+ accounts, but regular users could effectively use their circles to narrow the search space to relevant results.